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Hello,
I have a pair of Vandersteen 2ce sigs. They seem very placement sensitive and my room is not ideal as it is open on one side. Also, the back of the room while divided by arches, extends into the dining room/foyer. So basically the room only has one functional corner.
Anyway, my Polk SDA's and Norman Labs sound fine and full on most sources once I have the placement dialed in. They do not have the detail of the Vandersteens.
Problem is, I find myself forever moving the Vandersteens around. Very solid on one album, thin/shrill on the next. Cd's sre more consistent regarding uniformity of sound.
Are 'better' speakers like the Vandersteens that much more analytical and expected to vary between playback material like I am explaining?
Any insight/advice would be appreciated.
Gary
(I had planned of just keeping one pair, but now I am questioning whether to keep the Vandersteens or one of the older, more forgiving pairs.)
Follow Ups:
I have owned both the 2C and 2CE and I never considered them to be a "forgiving" loudspeaker.
Mine required "break-in" and were a bit thin sounding right out of the box, so be sure yours are properly broken in before making any significant changes to your system.
My 2C's were capable of revealing a tonearm/cartridge resonance problem that my previous loudspeakers had glossed over. As a result, I had to replace my phono cartridge with a better match for my tonearm.
I also eventually ended up replacing all of my electronics with tube equipment as I preferred the sound of the 'steens with tubes and I had to replace all of my cables to match the tube electronics. YMMV.
Thanks, yes I agree. They don't seem forgiving. I could get bass and top end but only at the expense of each other... Now I have good overall sound and it is transparent, thank goodness. Maybe I should bolt them to the floor! I appreciate everybody's help. Happy Thanksgiving.
The speakers are showing you more about the real sound of your system. I have only heard VA equipment in less than optimal show situations (last was Wash DC this summer) but I'd suspect they are letting attributes through not contributing a problem in and of themselves (unless you get down to fine points of taste in amp topologies)>
My thoughts would be:
1. The phonostage is exposed as tinny.
2. RF is a bigger problem now the the speakers are revealing more music.
3. Maybe the fullness was an artifact? Try to judge with simple acoustic music. You are not supposed to be inside the guitar in your room. Openness can be a sonic virtue. Maybe it's more realistic even if it's lost some density? Lesser equipment can be a great leveler.
The speakers are simply doing their job. Your ears is what's wacky.
Maybe, but with the propect of getting new ears so far out of reach, I feel compelled to learn more about setting my system up.
Try moving your chair around when the recording seems to sound off. Sometimes moving your chair a foot or two forward or backward can make a diff. Keep your chair, speakers on sliders for a while.
Maybe there is a Vinyl Asylum member that could come to this persons aid? It sounds like a TT problem. Where is he located?
I'm in Northwest Arkansas, fyi. Nearest town with expertise that I know of is Tulsa. I would appreciate any closer options if anyones knows my area. I'll ask at the Vinyl Asylum as well. Thanks.
I don't know, you may have an issue, but I know that when I had the 3A sigs, I'd set them up and they would sound fantastic...But a week or two later, I found myself moving them trying to improve the sound. It went on until I sold them...constantly moving them. My room wasn't perfect and that may of been the issue even using a lot of room treatment.
I appreciate the feedback. I need to get the system settled in so I can spend time listening. Funny this is the vintage speakers I have suit me better for some reason. I am going to try a little longer with the Vandersteen and then cycle them out. When the Vandersteens sound good, they sound real good. Don't know why I'm so fickled toward them. Thanks again.
The description of your problem is a little vague. You mention constantly having to move them. Are you finding them sounding good in various spots, but it changes by the recording? Or are they just not sounding good at all?One thing to consider is the room interaction and the loudspeakers. We've never measured a Vandersteen speaker to see what it does on axis and off axis, but one thing people don't understand is what's meant by wide and/or controlled dispersion. Essentially, the sound you hear at the listening position is a combination of the direct, reflected, and reverberant soundfields. Not just the direct, which is what some people assume. That's why it's important to look at what a speaker does on and off axis.
In my experience, speakers that are well-behaved on axis but have poor off-axis behavior can be quite difficult to place in the room and you can find that you need to move them around to get the best positioning. You're basically playing with the speaker's interaction in the room and trying to adjust for the off-axis anomalies usually. However, there's a chance that you won't get it right if you can't find a spot that gives you the correct overall balance.
Doug Schneider @ SoundStageNetwork.com
Edits: 11/20/10
I have Gershman Avant Garde's. Wonderful speaker. In our old house they were in a 16' wide by 22' long room. I sat about 10-12' away from the speakers, which were 3' from the back wall and about 9' apart. A few degrees of toe-in, but nothing drastic. It took several weeks to find what I felt was a very good, repeatable arrangement. Once I found it, I had no desire to mess with it.
If I got up and walked around the house, the off-axis response was not as pleasant as when I had Aerial Model 8's. The 8's sounded good on the back porch! The A-G's lost their magic once you left the side-side boundaries of the sweet spot.
New house: Nearly square room with angled ceilings that reach 9 or 10' high. I think the room is 17 x 19. I have to sit 7-8' away from the speakers. They are about 7' apart and 3' from the wall. Optimum sound so far seems to be toe-in nearly to the point of intersecting at the listening position. The center vocal is very captivating and stands out nicely with this arrangement. So far, so good.
Still experimenting, and I, too, am hearing more variations in recordings as compared to listening in the other, larger room. But I am learning to accept the recordings and enjoy the music now that I have the speaker placement optimized (for the time being).
Speakers are 7' apart along the 21' long wall. Distance from the rear wall determined according to the Cardas method which can be found in the FAQs here at the asylum.I find it to be very satisfactory both in terms of frequency response and sound stage.
.
"Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to" Mark Twain
Edits: 11/20/10
Your setup and room look great to me.I find some slight toe-in very beneficial in focusing the soundstage and bringing the midrange forward a little. (I have Quatros, and they should be similar in behavior.)
I'd suggest looking in to changes to your analog rig.
Edits: 11/21/10
?? I'm quite happy with it and I'm not the one having the problem
"Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to" Mark Twain
Wasn't paying attention and thought you were the OP posting a pic of his setup.
that dawned on me after I posted
"Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to" Mark Twain
I notice a chalk mark on the carpet behind the speaker.Was the speaker there before? If so,how did it sound different from the present Cardas position? Is Vandy more vulnerable in the matter of positioning?
Regards
Bill
If you look closely, the present location is/was also marked and, yes, they are very sensitive to placement regardless of what anyone says.The original was per Vandersteen (he uses odd [1/3, 1/5 etc.]numbers/measurements) and I found the Cardas to be more natural. YMMV. I have also tried thirds in both directions with nice results but rather intrusive on the room space.
The depth of the room is 15' - left that out before.
"Man is the only animal that blushes - or needs to" Mark Twain
Edits: 11/20/10 11/21/10
The speakers are designed to be coherent over their working frequency range, so room anomalies will upset this more so than they will the presentation of incoherent speakers.
You can do some simple experiments with spare blankets and blue masking tape to see if prominent corners or flat surfaces in your listening area cause the sensitivity to placement and program that you report. Keep in mind that outward wall corners act as virtual line sources, and flat areas act as beaming panels. Glass panes, in windows or cabinets, are especially bad reflectors as they add their own acoustic signatures.
I'm assuming your electronics are properly supported and do not respond to bass from the speakers.
I moved the speakers toward the center of the room and it helped alot with the high frequency trouble. The move did however cause me to lose the wide soundstage. I'll experiment with the room treatments and see if that helps. With the speakers further apart, they seem to sound best and worst, depending on the album. Thanks everybody for the geat ideas, there is alot of expertis in here.
Vandys shrill?? If anything, most of them err on the "polite" side of the spectrum.
RTFM - their setup description is the best I've seen from any speaker manufacturer and deserves a little study.
Then look at your vinyl rig, especially if you are getting (quelle horreur!) better sound from CD. Proper cartridge alignment, good match of cartridge compliance with effective tonearm mass, correct tracking force, good stylus, good preamp with appropriate loading for your cartridge... the usual suspects.
WW
There is NO substitute for the live performance.
You don't mention it, so it always has to be asked with these speakers, have you spent some time getting their tilt set correctly? I would even go so far as to use a laser level, checking at the listening position to make sure both speakers are tilted exactly the same way.
It's true that better speakers will make one more aware of flaws in a recording, but they shouldn't exaggerate flaws. Perhaps you need to spend some time on your analog frontend instead.
I don't think the shape of the room is a problem if you keep the speakers and your ears well away from boundaries. I like to keep my speakers at least 4 feet from the side walls.
Well, recordings ARE highly variable in quality, and more resolving speakers WILL reveal the differences between them (and the shortcomings of the bad ones) more clearly. The Vandies are generally regarded as "smooth, forgiving" speakers, but they will still tell you the truth about overly bright/edgy recordings. But don't they make the best recordings more enjoyable?
Seems the options are to (A) only listen to "audiophile approved" recordings, (B) simply accept that some of your favorite music is poorly recorded and "listen through" the problems, or (C) install a good EQ that will let you reduce the treble level on the shrill ones. If you sell the Vandies, you will probably wind up missing them and regretting the decision.
Thanks for the feedback. Yes, I agree with you on regretting the sale. I am listening to an album now and the sound is awesome. The eq may be the ticket, as my preamp has no tone controls. Would my turntable contribute to the inconsistencies, or are the speakers most likely the culprit in your opinion?
I agree with Caspian that Vandersteens tend to be on the warm and forgiving side. It could be your phono cartidge, it could be amplification, it could be recording quality and it could be that you are just really sensitive to certain kinds of distortions.
Hello, thanks. I tried adding my system a couple of times. Should be there now, unless I am doing something wrong?
I think the cartridge might be at least part of your problem. I recommend a Shure M97xe as a totally non-fatiguing upgrade for not a ton of money.
I haven't heard your Van Alstine gear. I tend not to be a Van Alstine fan but my experience is limited to their gear from the 1980s & 1990s.
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